Career Awareness Fair held for 10th-grade students in Shelby County

The Greater Shelby County Chamber held its inaugural Career Awareness Fair program, sponsored by Legacy Community Federal Credit Union, for 10th-grade students throughout Shelby County April 23- 24.

During both days, over 100 volunteers from various careers took time out from their work schedules to meet with more than 2,000 students from 12 high schools to share information about career opportunities available to them in Shelby County.

In addition to learning about careers, the students also heard about the educational requirements for those careers, what type of salaries they could expect in that career, and helpful tips on what they can do now to better prepare themselves to be successful in their pursuit of that career.

Each student visited two of the 16 booths set up at the Shelby County Exhibition Center in Columbiana.

The participating high schools included: Oak Mountain, Montevallo, Thompson and Calera on 23, and Pelham, Chelsea, Vincent, Shelby County Career & College Center, Helena, Shelby County, Cornerstone Christian and Kingwood Christian on April 24.

The Chamber’s Education Work Group developed this program to follow up on the successful “Keeping It Real” program for more than 2,600 ninth-grade students throughout Shelby County. That program, which just completed its second year in April, enables volunteers from the Chamber to meet with students to help them start thinking about their future and discussing the importance of fiscal responsibility.  

The Career Awareness Fair and the Keeping It Real program are an outgrowth of the Greater Shelby Chamber’s 5-year Strategic Plan and are part of the Chamber’s efforts in workforce development. The Chamber believes that meeting with Shelby County students once a year, at different stages of their high school careers, will help ensure that Shelby County businesses have the qualified workforce they’ll need in the future.

-Submitted by Keith Brown, Interim President of Jefferson State Community College & Vice Chair of Community & Workforce Development for the Greater Shelby County Chamber of Commerce